I have a dog that has a great sniffer and follows tracks of people and animals with her nose down in the ground. She does a good job and generally follows them until she gets to pavement ( it's not more than 200 feet). I would like to train some footstep tracking for her to have fun and so I learn a little more about tracking.

When I started doing some tracking with her, I had a MAJOR problem that she walked around with her nose permanently on the ground and I couldn't get her attention easily. It's hard to train high-jump when the dog is still trying to track.

It is important that this dog NOT sniff around when we are doing certain activities. I can only think e-collar because this is for off-leash stuff, but I don't want to completely confuse her.

I'm guessing this is not the only dog who has this problem. Ideas?

Mine's the same; nose always down. It hasn't really hurt tracking, especially since I learned that foot-step tracking is an exercise in obedience! Keeping this in mind went a long way to relax me when the dog is not tracking and has her nose down, and to enhanced my approach to working with her on tracking itself. When heeling she sniffs around too sometimes; this I do not want. What I do is just correct verbally "nose-up!" and give a slight pop with the leash. Overtime she has learned what "nose up" has come to mean and I can command this off leash at a distance too.

My tracking experience is limited and I has only trained it with the one dog, but at least that is one opinion for you, Anne. I'm interested to hear others as well!

Obviously you have more tracking experience than me! I'd like to figure out a solution to this and learn some more about training tracking.

I'd like to train my pup to track (she serious lacks focus). I expect to have the same issue with her, so I haven't started it.

Well Anne, I, like you desperately wanted to get into tracking but lacked a decent coach (even a bad one LOL) to help me in the beginning. I have studied different articles available on the web and purchased four of the Leerburg DVDs on tracking. This has given me a pretty good grasp of the theory of tracking training but I am still limited in my hands-on knowledge since I've only been able to apply the theory to one dog.

Basically anything I would tell you about getting started can be found in previous threads under the Sport Tracking section of the forum.

A couple things I can mention are things that I would do differently if I had my time over again; so read some of the previous Sport Tracking posts before reading on...

First, I would not have stomped in my foot prints on the track so much in the beginning. Each print I made, I really beat the grass to create a lot of scent. I am now working on really reducing the scent left behind on a track and my previous method of track laying has lead to two problems for me. I am having to take a long time to reduce track scent and the dog is encountering some difficulty staying on track because she has come to rely on the overload of scent and using her eyes, instead of her nose, at times. These two problems may work themselves out with more practice but I can't see the future, LOL.

Second, I probably would have done more short tracks in the beginning to establish better form. Sometimes she will shoot down only one side (at least try to) of a tack instead of tracking side to side to find each print. We are also getting over this but still.. the whole ESP thing. Don't get me wrong we were doing short tracks (after scent pads) for a few weeks, but what I would change is do more than one short track in a session.

There's probably some other things I would change too but can't think of them right now.

I think I'm doing okay on my own. What gets me down is that it seems from reading some of the other members posts from time to time that I should be way farther ahead in our proficiency than we are. Lacking a coach this is hard for me to even assess.

I had some of the same problems. Even on short tracks that are marked, I loose the track.

When I walk my dog along the highway, she follows tracks of the people that walk there. She doesn't go side to side with her nose. When I started slowing her down to pick up every step, she got really confused.

Ed's tracking DVDs have too much information in them for me. Makes my head hurt. I learned so much from the book "Learning the Behavior" I got the book for the obedience stuff and was surprised to see that 1/2 of the book is about tracking. I was more surprised that I was actually understanding it! That's when I got brave and started doing short tracks.

I had to stop training because I couldn't get my dog to STOP tracking. I couldn't do anything else because her nose was firmly on the ground.

Brad & Anne: You two might find this site helpful: http://www.schutzhundtracking.com/